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SimCity sells 1.1 million in first two weeks

Electronic Arts has announced that SimCity has sold more than 1.1 million copies within its two week launch window. The number reflects sell through to consumers and around 54 percent of users purchased a digital version of the title. 44 percent of sales came through EA's Origin online store.

"SimCity had a great weekend with sales strong across both North America and Europe, adding to overwhelming demand at launch that has us tracking well beyond expectations for the game," said EA chief operating officer Peter Moore. "SimCity is one of the storied brands in gaming, and Maxis delivered a game re-envisioned and engineered for the online age."

These strong sales persisted despite the game's rough reception due to connectivity issues. EA did not detail what percentage of sales came prior to the reports of gamers being shut out of SimCity due to the always-online requirements, so there's no visibility on if negative reports led to a sales drop-off. EA says it has increased server capacity by more than 400 percent to deal with demand, but a number of the game's community features remain offline.

EA is also boasting 1.3 million peak concurrent users on Origin, thanks in part to users playing SimCity.

For users that suffered through SimCity's connectivity issues, EA has offered one free Origin game in recompense. Interested users must purchase and register their copy of SimCity prior to March 25 and claim their free game by March 30. Offered games include standard editions of Battlefield 3, Dead Space 3, Mass Effect 3, Medal of Honor: Warfighter, Need for Speed: Most Wanted, Bejeweled 3, Plants vs. Zombies, and the deluxe edition of SimCity 4. More information on the offer can be found here.

If only the servers were the only issues - read the Eurogamer review, just for starters, many sites that took time to play extended sessions over days have found a laundry list of glaring bugs and fundementally broken systems underlying the very foundation of the the game - some will no doubt be remedied through patches over the coming months but some core systems are so broken at the moment, It's not exactly clear if everything can be made to work as it was intended... I hope they can pull it off but one has to wonder if, by the time Maxis gets the servers stable...region resource sharing functioning, pathfinding and Ai somewhat fixed and core economic systems patched - how many fans will have lost interest or feel angry enough to never return?

Sadly, robust long term sales of SimCity is hardly assured the way things are looking:

I'm really enjoying SimCity, at its core its a fantastic game that has been let down by high level misdirection/errors of judgement and post release support. But its clear to me that all the hard work of the team really paid off, I have already sunk 40 hours game time into it and having a blast playing with my friends.

I would have returned my game if I could. Server problems are just the tip of the iceberg on this stinker. Cities are tiny - 7 blocks by 7 blocks with the game's recommended spacing, which allows for a total of 4 high-density buildings on each square block. AI is terrible. The much-hyped simulation of individual sims is overly simplistic to the point that EA's claims about it amount to deceptive advertising.